You Capture - B&W editing

Wednesday, July 21

I love B&W photos although I almost never shoot in B&W. Usually I just see a picture and then see how it looks in B&W later. I wanted to show a little editing I found on Picasa - I'm sure many have used this before, but this photo really demonstrates it well. Here is the unedited version.

Here is the regular B&W conversion. See how everything looks the same intensity.

Then I tried the filtered B&W tool on the effects tab in Picasa (be sure to undo the regular B&W first). Then you can move the cursor around to see what different shades you can get. By selecting something in the pink range, it makes everything pink look lighter which really makes the flower stand out. Then I did auto contrast and a little sharpening. Viola!

I'm not saying I would choose this over the color version, but what a difference right?

Is it OK to have a little color? Because I can't talk about editing B&W without including a shot like this. Before cropping and editing it was a little boring because no one was looking at the camera, but now I like it.

Here is the color accent tutorial from Pioneer Woman if you have Photoshop.

Last weekend we went to the Cathedral Park Jazz Festival in Portland, OR. The park is under the St. John's bridge, which most people agree is the best looking bridge in town. Here's a view from under the bridge.

Here is one of my favorite photos of the St. John's Bridge that I took a while ago, but I really have to share it. It's the first time I took a cool picture of something other than my kids.

To see all the other great B&W You Capture photos click here.